The first artist to release a song written by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards was the UK singer George Bean who recorded the track ‘Will You Be My Lover Tonight’ in 1964, (before The Stones had released any singles).

David Lee Roth’s uncle, Manny Roth, owned the New York establishment Cafe Wha? in the early 1960s, where the likes of Bob Dylan, Jimi Hendrix, Bruce Springsteen and The Velvet Underground all hung out.

Forty-four years ago, students, activists and political leaders looked at the impact human population was having on the world around them and decided something needed to be done. Earth Day was born, and the modern environmental movement wasn’t far behind.

Since then, there have been a lot more births. Billions more. In the 44 years since the first Earth Day, our population has increased by nearly 95 percent (and we still add 227,000 people to the planet each day).

That’s more people using more land and water, eating more meat, paving more wild places, demanding more energy and producing more climate-changing emissions. More cars and more consumerism; more trash and more pollution.

The one thing we don’t have more of: Earth

We still only have one planet. Though you wouldn’t know it by the way we live our lives, especially here in the U.S. In fact, if everyone in the world lived like Americans, it would take 4.4 Earths to sustain the planet. Unfortunately, among all those Earth Day sales for yard accessories, eco-friendly t-shirts and other mass-produced “green” products, you won’t find a single spare Earth on clearance.

There are a few things this Earth Day has less of than the first celebration 44 years ago. Most notably absent are the conversations about our runaway population growth and overconsumption, what it’s doing to wildlife and the environment, and what we need to do about it if we’re really going to save the planet… and ourselves.

It’s time to go retro on Earth Day. There were 3.7 billion people on the planet for the first Earth Day in 1970, and one of the biggest concerns then was that our growing population was destroying the planet and driving other species to extinction. Now that we have 7.2 billion people on the planet, the one thing we need more of is concern about human population and the extinction crisis.

The Center for Biological Diversity is bringing population back to Earth Day this year by giving away 44,000 Endangered Species Condoms in honor of the 44th anniversary of the celebration. More than 500 volunteers across all 50 states will be bringing the condoms to Earth Day festivals, parties and other community events to get more people talking about the issue that inspired the original Earth Day.

The Kate Bush album ‘Never For Ever’ was the first album by a British female solo artist to top the UK album chart as well as being the first album by any female solo artist to enter the chart at No.1.

As you can see above, it took no more than 20 seconds for this woman’s farm visit to turn into YouTube gold.

OKay, so getting sneezed on, whether by a person or an animal, is always gross, but homegirl’s reaction is truly one of terror. It’s kind of hard to stop watching it (but don’t worry, there’s a slow-mo replay at the end).

What comes to mind when you think of the tech industry: cutting-edge products that make our lives easier, disruptive technology to keep us connected, over great distances, innovations that make our lives more enjoyable? I’d say yes to all three, but the latest consumer electronics (CE) items now arriving on retail shelves are breaking ground in another way. They’re designed, built and sold with environmental sustainability and energy efficiency in mind.

What’s prompting CE companies to think green? You are. Unlike what we’re witnessing in the energy sector, where the government and industry engage in a constant tug-of-war – our industry strives to balance what consumers want from our devices and what we all need as global citizens. That’s why we’re working together to create more energy-efficient and earth-friendly products and services.

Increasingly, at CE companies, designers are taking the environmental impact of raw materials into account when deciding how new products are made. For example, manufacturers are moving away from so-called virgin plastics and resins, because the extraction process emits CO2. Instead, they’re using more recycled plastics and finding new ways to make recyclables more eco-friendly.

CE manufacturers are also finding new alternatives to toxic substances in the design and manufacturing of next-generation products. Cathode ray tube (CRT) TVs and old computer monitors contain lead and other potentially hazardous substances. Not only are companies now eliminating these materials from their production lines in exchange for safer components, the CE industry as a whole is also innovating to find solutions for recycling CRT glass.

The CRT Challenge is a crowd-sourced competition supported by the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA)® that challenges researchers to develop with new uses for CRT glass. Energy-efficient furnaces, lead-shielding tiles and bricks, and a new method for storing nuclear waste are just a few of the winning solutions during the first two challenges held in 2012 and 2013.

CEA is also working with the U.S. Energy Department and the Natural Resources Defense Council to make television set-top boxes more energy efficient. This voluntary agreement will ensure that 90 percent of new set-top boxes meet the Environmental Protection Agency’s ENERGY STAR 3.0 efficiency levels by 2017, saving more than $1 billion in residential energy savings every year. As Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz pointed out, this type of public-private collaboration not only saves consumers money by saving energy, but also keeps pace with our industry’s rapid rate of technological innovation.

Perhaps the greatest environmental responsibility of the CE industry is to ensure you know how to reduce the environmental impact of your devices. Resources like GreenerGadgets.org can help you find nearby recycling locations simply by entering your zip code, and offer tips for how to live green and buy green. In part because of consumer-facing initiatives like these, the CE industry arranged for more than 620 million pounds of electronics to be recycled last year – more than double the amount recycled in 2010, according to CEA’s eCycling Leadership Initiative report.

Consumers deserve plenty of credit as increasingly you consider the environmental impact of CE devices before you reach the checkout counter. More than 80 percent of consumers recognize and understand the ENERGY STAR label on their products. And other labels like the Green Electronics Council’s global rating system and the Electronic Product Environmental Assessment Tool (EPEAT) can help you make greener purchasing decisions.

We all share the responsibility of protecting our planet. Leveraging the power of innovation, the consumer electronics industry is voluntarily leading the way to improve sustainability and increase the energy efficiency of the devices we all rely on. Working together, we can drastically decrease our environmental impact and create a greener world. Find out what you can do at http://ift.tt/1imNoZO not just now, during Earth Month, but all year long.